Varanasi: Ghazipur police lodged an FIR against Samajwadi Party MP Afzal Ansari and two arms clerks on the charges of disappearance of files related to an arms licence, criminal conspiracy and suspicion of misuse of a weapon.Ghazipur SP Iraj Raja on Wednesday said, based on outcomes of verification of 145 firearms bought and sold on 51 arms licences procured by the family and members of gangster-turned-politician Mukhtar Ansari’s IS-191 gang, an FIR was lodged against Afzal Ansari, first arms clerk Asfaq Ahmad and second arms clerk Gauri Shankar Ram under sections 409 (criminal breach of trust by public servant), 120B (criminal conspiracy) IPC and 21, 25, 30 Arms Act.Following the orders of DIG Varanasi range, Vaibhav Krishna, the process of verification and investigation in all the arms licences issued to Mukhtar’s family and gang members was started last month. Raja said investigation and physical verification of 145 weapons bought and sold on a total of 51 arms licenses was being done.Teams constituted under the ASP (city) and ASP (rural) went to various districts of UP as well as Delhi, Punjab and Arunachal Pradesh and examined arms files in the offices of the district magistrate and licensed shops concerned. During the investigation, Raja said, some arms licence files and purchase-sale files related to the Ghazipur DM office were not found available in the record room.The file related to licence number 1188 P2 issued to Afzal Ansari was also among the files missing from the record room, he said, adding, outcomes of initial investigation hinted clearly that the arms licensee, in collusion and conspiracy with the then arms clerks, made these files disappear. The current status of rifle number 830405 purchased on the same licence could also not be ascertained, he added.Taking serious note of it, he said, an order was issued to lodge an FIR with Kotwali police against Afzal Ansari and two arms clerks. Police teams were carrying out investigation and verification of the remaining weapons and arms licenses.
